MInd The Gap

I consider myself fairly unshockable, but if I thought that meant I could avoid tumbling headlong into the generation gap, I was wrong.

The gap just didn't turn out to be what I had in mind. I certainly never expected to be shocked by my children’s attitude to kissing and the monarchy. I assumed they would be crazy about one and indifferent to the other…. but what do I know?

A long time ago, in her early teens, my daughter said she only liked kissing ‘like in the movies’. She has since celebrated her first anniversary with her boyfriend, so I guessed that things had probably moved on. She & her boyfriend both have tongue studs, so when recently I asked if they clacked together when they kiss – she gave me a withering stare and snapped, ‘No! How many times do I have to tell you? Tongues are out! Snogging is so over, it’s so 90s!’

She went on to say that none of her girlfriends ‘use tongues’– or if they did, ‘only a tiny bit.’ With the tip or something? I have no idea.
When I suggested that actually, it was rather lovely and certainly erotic, she brought the full weight of her teen scorn to bear with whole body squirming and repeated shrieking, ‘No! It’s revolting! Revolting! Revolting!’

Truly baffling.

A quick aside on tongue studs...

I was utterly horrified to find that my little darlin' had pierced her tongue and was now sporting clunky mouth cutlery - but if anyone has ever tried it, it's damn hard to grab a tongue that's not your own.
I think what teenagers who 'wear' tongue studs are saying is they're a little bit Jack the Lad. What the dental hygienist says about their effect on tooth enamel is that they're a little bit Jack the Hammer. What can you do? If they are rebellious, they'll just find something else. I just have to hope she'll tire of it.

They say that tongues are the fastest healing organ in the body, but if that is true, doesn't the tongue heal around the studs, leaving a blowhole out of which the ex-stud wearer will be extracting strands of spaghetti into old age?

Back to the main thrust.....

I then got onto the subject of the Queen with my son, while he was on 'study' leave revising for this Classical Civilisation exam. He is about to turn seventeen and wanting to buy him a suit, I asked him to give me some pointers. Never once taking his eyes off his Star Wars, The

Force Unleashed X-box game, he issued the following instructions:
‘My motto is – actually I haven’t got one yet…but while I'm working on it, my on-the-spot-bystander-motto is "Dress to Win." I’ll give you an example. If you’re at an event, which requires a certain smartness & someone hasn’t tried - there’s always one - they're just retarded to be perfectly honest.

It’s so easy to just to make the effort.

If you want to be remembered, dress to impress.

It’s like Achilles, he wanted to be remembered & I embrace that.

He was the greatest badass of all time. Not only was he greatest warrior at Troy, but he was the most handsome and Homer makes a big deal of that.
As for Odysseus, he’s referred to as "God-like" endlessly, so of course he must have nailed it in the the clothes department too - apart from being a midget.

It’s all to do with being sane. To dress well it’s all got to make sense, so if you can’t make sense, it’s because you’re just a little bit insane. Have you got that Blood?’

‘Darling you can’t call people “Blood” it’s embarrassing. You're not from a gang in South Central LA.'
“I don’t call people Blood – wouldn’t dream of it. Not cool. I only call you Blood.’
‘Why?’

‘Because you're my mother and it amuses me; now shall I go on?’
‘If there's more.’
‘There is. Anything by Tom Ford is cool. Fact.
For the weekend think Brad Pitt. He’s got the cool thing tied down - a bit reckless, a bit playful with his outfits. His hats aren’t great - but with Angelina on his arm it's hard to concentrate on what's on his head.
For weekday clothes think George Clooney. He dresses like a smooth criminal, no shininess, it’s all toned down; he looks like he just stepped out of a black tie event to chill for five. He’s saying, “Kids, one day - but not today.”
Put it like this, if he & the Queen rolled the red carpet scene together - that would be sweet.’
‘You like the Queen?’ I said, taken aback that she'd even made it onto his radar.

‘Sure, I like her. She’s pimping 24/7. Even though she’s married to a lame jeb who isn’t even a king, she’s cool, she’s charismatic; she doesn’t take shit from anyone. Face it, she’s just an old German woman, so it’s a miracle she looks like she does. She’s a rocksteady legend. What I’m saying is, it could have been so much worse. When she’s dressed up in her furs and bling, she looks like Snoop Dogg. They could swap clothes and no one would know. Trust.'

And henceforth to be known as Ho Maj LizBeth2.